Night flying rules should be changed

Australian aviation regulators are calling for major changes to night flying rules after the release of a report into the ABC helicopter crash in 2011 found the pilot had become disoriented after the takeoff on a dark night.

Transcript

EMMA ALBERICI, PRESENTER: An independent aviation safety expert has told Lateline that regulators have been too slow to tighten rules on night flying.

The Civil Aviation Safety Authority is now introducing major changes to the rules, following the release of a report on the ABC helicopter crash at Lake Eyre in 2011.

Three ABC staff were killed in that accident.

Investigators found that the pilot became disoriented soon after takeoff on a dark night.

This report from John Stewart.

JOHN STEWART, REPORTER: Reporter Paul Lockyer, cameraman John Bean and pilot Gary Ticehurst died when the ABC helicopter crashed at Lake Eyre in August, 2011.

MARTIN DOLAN, ATSB CHIEF COMMISSIONER: Si the helicopter took off, flew initially towards the north-east, corrected its course and one of the people on the ground of the tour party actually tried to radio the helicopter to ask about their initially course because they understood it was in the wrong direction for where they intended to go.

JOHN STEWART: The twin-engine helicopter took off from an island at Cooper Creek inlet at 7 o'clock in total darkness. Within two minutes, it had reached a height of 500 metres. It was travelling in the wrong direction, possibly due to wrong GPS coordinates. The GPS was reprogrammed and the chopper then turned. Without being able to see the horizon, investigators say the pilot became spatially disorientated. The helicopter began descending on an angle with increasing speed, with only 20 seconds to do something about it.

MARTIN DOLAN: A 20-second window, a sequence of things really needed to be done to actually get a signal that there was a problem, to assess what that signal meant and then to work out what needed to be done to correct the situation and then do it. And in terms of human perception and decision making, that's a very tight timeframe for dealing with the situation that the helicopter was in.

JOHN STEWART: Regulators are tightening night flying rules. The Civil Aviation Safety Authority says in the future helicopters which fly at night with passengers must have an auto-pilot system or a two-pilot crew. Not all helicopters are required to have an auto-pilot, but safety investigators say it may have prevented this accident.

MARTIN DOLAN: If our understanding of the sequence is, which is about potentially reprogramming a GPS, it would have kept the helicopter on track and level while those adjustments were made and so it would have added an extra defence to the system.

JOHN STEWART: Colin Weir is an aviation safety consultant with more than 40 years of flying experience. He says that many countries have much stricter VFR, or visual flight rules, than Australia, and there's been a string of night-flying fatalities across the country.

COLIN WEIR, AVIATION SAFETY CONSULTANT: If you go back through the history of the sad legacy of night VFR, you will see the accidents that have happened, something like nine in 12 or 15 years, you know, going back in time, but you've also got to look at it in a global context in the countries that it is allowed. And on the AOPA website under accidents, night VFR accidents, they list 235 night VFR accidents and the reports are accessible there as well and every single one of those was fatal.

JOHN STEWART: Colin Weir welcomes the new night-flying regulations, but says that Australian aviation authorities have been too slow to act.

COLIN WEIR: There's absolutely no doubt that the changes should have come in many years ago to prevent the accidents that have happened.

JOHN STEWART: The ABC has banned night-flying until its helicopter and pilot training systems are updated.

John Stewart, Lateline.

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